Director of the LSU Didactic Program in Dietetics is awarded Outstanding Dietitian of the Year
October 08, 2021
LSU Assistant Professor Erin McKinley was awarded the 2021 Louisiana Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics Outstanding Dietitian of the Year. McKinley was recognized at the Louisiana Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics Annual Conference and Training on March 19, 2021.
McKinley is an Assistant Professor the LSU School of Nutrition and Food Sciences and the Director of the LSU Didactic Program in Dietetics. She is also a Registered Dietitian, Certified Health Education Specialist and Certified Lactation Counselor.
“It is a great honor to be recognized as Louisiana’s Outstanding Dietitian of the Year within my first decade of being a Registered Dietitian. It is also exciting that in three short years of living in Louisiana, I have been able to make an impact on the profession of dietetics and our local community,” McKinley stated.
The Outstanding Dietitian of the Year is the highest honor awarded to the top Registered Dietitian in each state each year. The recipient is a member of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics who exemplifies what it means to be a dietitian, serves the public, and has dedicated a significant amount of time volunteering in service and leadership roles within the Academy and its local affiliates.
McKinley began working at LSU in March of 2018 and has diligently worked over the last three years to advance dietetics education at LSU and the practice of dietetics in Louisiana. She is currently researching ways to create and test new scales to measure psychological components related to infant feeding.
Before coming to LSU, McKinley obtained both her Ph.D. in Health Education and Health Promotion and M.S. degree in Human Nutrition from The University of Alabama.
McKinley is the current secretary of the Louisiana Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, incoming president of the Baton Rouge Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics (second term), and treasurer of the Public Health Community Nutrition Practice Group.
She mentors over a dozen nutrition and dietetics students and professionals across the US. She has recently started a student success podcast titled “Geauxing All In: Get the Edge You Need to Succeed” on YouTube, which aims to increase student exposure to supervised practice programs during the pandemic.
McKinley stated, “I am looking forward to continuing my hard work to help put Louisiana RDs on the map as some of the best in the country.”
The complete list of Outstanding Dietitians of the Year award winners is published annually in the Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. Each awardee receives a letter of congratulations and a certificate signed by the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics president.